I want to be a rock star!
by fowo
Summary: Mikau had always wanted to be a musician. He became a rock star.


Mikau had always wanted to be a musician. When he was a boy, he started with the piano, which his father – may every god and deity be in his favour – thought was fit for an educated young lad. When Mikau taught himself to play guitar – self-earned, self-bought, also a classical piece – his father seemed proud.

Only when Mikau found out you can get an amp and plug it in and shred the house to pieces, they began to argue. "A rockstar!" his father roared. "You got the blood of Zoraean heroes flowing in your veins and you want to be a rockstar? You're not worth the pain your mother hat to bear to birth you!"

"I ihatched/i from an iegg/i" Mikau replied, grabbed his guitar and left in anger.

He wandered around in the Great Bay area, not sure where to go and where he wanted to be.

He did end up in front of some joint, heavy, loud music evaporating from it like honey off a spoon, soothing Mikau's anger making him curious. He stepped inside.

Photos hung on the walls, covering them from floor to ceiling, photos of biceps, necks, back, thighs, all covered with ink. There were girls, many of them very explicit, symbols Mikau had never seen before, epic scenery, stories even, everything you could think of, including things Mikau actually couldn't.

"Heya," came a slurred hello from the shades. Mikau coughed some smoke away and just now noticed a guy sitting a guy sitting in a corner, reading a magazine and smoking. He looked kinda beat-down, unlike most Zora males Mikau knew, his head fin was very short, his temple fins though were broad and long, hiding most of this face. He was skinny and lanky. Very different from Mikau. "What can I do for you?"

"What is this place?" asked Mikau, still trying to grasp all the pictures.

"Uh, a tattoo store?" came the reply, and Mikau wasn't too sure if the guy was being sarcastic or not so sure himself.

"Tattoo?" Mikau came from a good, honourable family. As proud as his father was of their bloodline, there wasn't much heroism, no weapons, no war trophies, no legends around the fireplace. But Mikau spoke several languages, could play the piano and all the classical pieces, could dance and converse. He knew how to behave around humans, even Gorons.

And now, standing there, in a thick smoke screen under a low ceiling, seeing the pictures of tattoos around him, his beloved guitar still in his hands, he wanted to change all this.

If his father wanted him to be a heir of heroes, he was going to do it his way.

"I want one," he said, without further thinking.

"Cool, dude," said the guy, brightening up the slightest. "Whaddaya want?"

"Uh," said Mikau, "I don't know. Anything, really."

"Let's start with somethin' small then, shall we? It's your first ink, too, right? Let's just try it out. Come with me." The guy led Mikau to a room in the back, where there were some chairs, a giant lamp and some medical looking machinery.

"I'm Japas, by the way," he said, holding out a hand. "Good to meet ya. Sit down."

"Mikau." He shook his hand and sat down in front of Japas. "So what do we do?"

"Mmh, I'm thinkin' somethin' like war paint, maybe? You seem like the kind," said Japas, giving his abs and biceps a weird look. "Y'know, stripes in your face or somethin'."

"Yes!" Mikau almost shouted. "I want that!"

"Okay, sheesh. So war paint it is. Blue? Like, on your jaw bones? Like so? Okay."

Japas opened a tank and took out a little sea-horse-like looking animal with a long, thin beak. It looked horrified, Japas didn't care, held it like a pen and pinched its cheeks between his long, slim fingers. The animal splurged some ink. "Here we go. Hold still. This is going to sting a little, but you seem like a tuff guy."

Mikau held his breath, looking at the ceiling. There was a pinch, pain, pain that became agony and, finally, a weird, dull, warm pleasure that Mikau hadn't known before.

"So what do you do?" asked Japas, near Mikau's face, concentrated on his work.

Mikau didn't think. He had run away from home, he was getting a tattoo, he could do what he wanted. "I'm a rockstar," he said.

"Cool. I play base myself. You?"

"Guitar," answered Mikau with the slightest nod towards his guitar that he left in the other room. "We should start a band!" It was out before Mikau could stop it.

Japas leaned back and paused. "Dude," he said. "You're a rockstar. Shouldn't you, like, have a band already or somethin'?"

"Yeah..." Mikau frowned. "I guess. Well..." He took a breath, and started telling his story. How he had no idea whatsoever about rock music, what his father wanted him to be, how he hated it, how he wished for another life.

"Dude, your dad's gonna spank your ass when he sees you got yourself ink from the dirtiest place in the entire Great Bay," said Japas, his laughter fading into a smokey cough.

Mikau made a face. "I don't think I want to go back anyway," he said silently.

"Yeah, we all go there, sooner or later." Japas leaned back, the exhausted little animal he used to ink Mikau with was wheezing. Japas flipped it back in its tank, taking out another. This one was furious, tried to bite him and put up a fight, but apparently Japas knew his equipment and wom the struggle eventually.

"Tell you what," he said finally. "You can crush on my couch for a while if you want. You seem like a good guy, I kinda feel sorry for you. My folks always let me do what I wanted, so I can only imagine how much it sucks to be raised like you were."

"That would be awesome," said Mikau, almost too excited to breathe. Pictures ran through his head, of a free life, with Japas, a guy his age, at his side, the two of them making music together, drinking alcoholic beverages until late at night, talking about girls and be whoever they wanted to be. Mikau felt like he had lived his entire life until now in a cage and now finally breathed the sweet scent of freedom. – It smelled like Japas' smokes and ink, but he loved it.

"And you're done," said Japas into the silence and handed Mikau a little mirror. "Whaddaya think?"

Mikau lifted the mirror up to his face. His cheeks were dark blue form the blood rushing in his veins where the beak of the inkling had pinched through his skin. And atop of that were two very neat, very blue, sharp lines on each cheek, from his cheek bone down to his jaw, down to his throat. It looked... it looked bad-ass.

"It's... totally awesome, man!" Mikau found himself almost shouting again.

Japas gave a little laugh. "Glad you like it, man. I mean it's my job, but I'm always happy to get it done properly."

"I really like it! It feels like it belongs there, I don't know what to say," said Mikau, carefully touching his new ink. " I owe you, man."

"Indeed you do, it's five-hundred rupees, please." Japas hold out his hand with a little cough.

"Five-," made Mikau, stopped mid-sentence and simply gave Japas the money, who gladly took it.

"Sorry man, gotta make a living, it's not like many people get inks nowadays. I'll close up for today, c'mon, let's go."

Japas closed the shop, Mikau standing next to him, his guitar in his arms, excited like never in his life before. He felt like a child when he walked besides Japas through Great Bay while Japas pointed out a few nice bars and pubs where there were open mic nights where Mikau could start his rockstar carreer if he wanted to.

So Mikau started to live with Japas, at first he wanted it just to be a few days before he'd return to his father, but days became weeks became months became years, and though he visited his father sometimes, who never accepted the choices his son made, he kept on living with Japas. Japas continued working as a tattoo artist for a while, he did each and every of Mikau's many tats to come, and only gave up the shop when he started to be in the reds. They got another roomie to pay the rent, and as things were, that roomie, a short, shy, calm lille fella named Tijô, played the drums really good, and at some point they started their own first band, Mikau wrote the lyrics, Japas the music, Tijô organized the entire thing, and they went from pub to pub, making a little money, making a name for themselves, getting to know people. And on one of these evenings, there was a guy, a catfish zora, a rare kind, proud, surely arrogant, but a god with the whale skull piano he played, and Mikau said he wouldn't rest until they had him in his band, and there were fights, and arguments, and finally they settled that Evan, the pianist, would be in the band if he could write the songs and be the leader. Japas always complained, he liked his tunes (his lyrics were horrible, though, but he knew that), Mikau just rolled his eyes at him. He often did. Tijô didn't mind, he never did.

And then one evening, Evan said he couldn't come to their practise room that night, a singer had asked for him on the piano especially to accompany her. He'd of course accepted, it was a big chance for his career.

"What career?" snapped Japas. "I think we're a band, why the hell would you do things on your own?"

"Relax," said Mikau. "Let him be. You know what, Evan, you get us in there so we can listen and it's okay. A little classical education won't hurt you, Jap."

"Ya'll can fuck off with your classical education," said Japas. "I thought we're rockstars, and ya want me to go to some posh concert? I don't think so."

"Relax, Japas," sighed Evan aggravated. "If it's anything to you, the singer is Lulu. I bet you have heard of her."

"Whoa. Wait, that chick, that, y'know, that from her mother, who sings and shit?"

"Couldn't have said it better," sighed Evan, which made Mikau laugh.

"It's decided, then! No practise today, just some classical music and moral support to our dear band leader!" Mikau rubbed his hands.

"Yeah Mikau, I don't believe your devotion one bit, but oh well. You can come." Evan waved his arms to the sky, wondering if any deity or god would have mercy, and then walked off to collect his things for the evening.

"Alright! Hot chicks!" said Japas, and Mikau rolled his eyes at him.

"We're going for educational reasons, you are inot/i going to hit on her. Understand?"

"Yeah, you'll see, by the end of the evening she's gonna hit on ime/i, because chicks love a base players."

"Oh yeah? I remember that differently." Mikau, strong and well-built as he was, singing and playing guitar, got a lot of attention from girls. The problem was, he was also very shy. At least when it came to girls. And other than Japas he wasn't so much interested in a quick number after a concert. Mikau had never had a girlfriend. Japas had one every week. Mikau got used to the embarrassed girls running out of their apartment in the morning after a concert.

Sure, Japas was his own way of handsome, but seriously, Mikau didn't really see him as a thread. At least to the kind of girls Mikau himself was interested in. Every girl that came hitting on him was more or less not of interest to him. (But they were pretty... and it was tempting...) If he ever wanted a girl, it had to be him who made the offer. He was the man. He was a heir of heroes! He would not be picked up by a girl like that. Oh no.

And then, when they sat in the concert hall, on stage Evan with this whale skull piano, the most beautiful women on earth stepped on stage. She wore a long, flowing, beautiful dress – Zora with clothes were rare, she must have been in the city of humans a lot – and had the most stunning azure-yet-violet-ish eyes in the world. Mikau's jaw dropped.

"Okay dude, that's like, the hottest chick ever." Mikau punched Japas on the ribs for that. "iDon't/i say that! That is a goddess. This is a goddes! I'm in love."

"Yeah man, you have no chance," said Japas, rubbing his aching side. "I mean that's Lulu. She's way outta your league."

"I remember you said almost the same about Evan."

"I didn't know you had a crush on him, too. Ouch! That hurts, you know!" Japas rubbed his side again where Mikau had laid another punch.

"I'm going backstage after the concert," he decided, ignoring Japas who listed the reasons why he shouldn't and why he would never be satisfied with the fangirls they already had.

They both fell silent after Lulu opened her mouth and began to sing.

And afterwards, Evan introduced them, and Lulu was the sweetest, most beautiful girl Mikau had ever seen, and they talked, and went to have a drink, Mikau brought her home that evening, but said good-bye and went like the gentlemen he was raised to be, and a month later, he had a girlfriend and a new singer for his band. They got a new name – the Indigo-Gos – and in weeks were the most famous band in Termina.

And Mikau was a rock star.


End file.
